Good morrow fair readers! As you can tell, this post isn’t being written by Steph or Irene. I’m Steph’s fella but you can call me Hubert (largely because there aren’t enough people called that anymore). I’m in town visiting her all week and I couldn’t resist writing a guest post on her wedding theme: specifically what you can wear to a casual or semi-formal wedding. I chose these largely because they’re the least rigid and they give me the most opportunity to show off in front of Steph with my awesome fashion knowledge (this is not actually a chance to show off as all I knows about fashion is essentially regurgitated like half chewed worms from the mouth of a particularly well dressed mother bird—i.e. Steph).

Nevertheless ladies, think of this as a chance to play dress up with the grown up equivalent of Barbie dolls (i.e. your boyfriend). You can sell it to him with the following sentence: “Yes I got it from a fashion blog. But it was written by a boy. Who likes girls. He has a beard, too.” Well, it’s worth a try…

Ladies, speaking as a a guy I can safely say that there is one thing that men love: that’s right, the plaid flannel shirt (editor’s note: the sound you hear is Steph yelling “NOOOOOO” across the interwebs. Never fear, it’s not what she thinks). Now, you can’t wear such a fabulous garment to a wedding for fear of upstaging the bride or groom but you can wear a pair of plaid pants. Not pajama pants or those weird things that your guy friends wore to ska shows in high school because they thought it was “so spirit of ‘77” but actual plaid dress pants. Essentially, you can use one of your man’s favourite patterns to trick him into being stylish. It’s the perfect crime!

After you perpetrate this fashionably spectacular ruse your guy will feel as though he has pulled one over on you. This gives you a chance to move in for the sartorial kill. He will be vulnerable and in the mood to try and give something back to you (editor’s note: when guys feel like they’ve fooled their girlfriend the guilt kicks in and you can ask them to do almost anything). This is when you choose a shirt in a complimentary colour that he would not usually wear for himself. He feels like he’s doing something nice for you and you get to be seen in public with a man that looks like he knows how to dress himself. Everybody wins!

Finally we have the tie. Chances are your boyfriend has had to dress up for something at some point in his past and probably owns a necktie or two. The possible problem with this situation is that they will likely be hideous (use the comments to ask Steph about some of the things I have worn in the past. She still has nightmares). Once again though, you have a surefire method of getting your way. Remember those plaid pants from the first paragraph? The ones that made your guy feel all sly and crafty like? They’re your ace in the hole. Not guilt. Not this time. Simple practicality is what will win the day. Plaid is a pattern. A strongly defined pattern. It takes a keen fashion sense to find things that will match them without looking hideous. You know it. He knows it. He’s not going to want to look ridiculous after seeing how hip he’s looking in the threads you picked out. In this particular case, a solid colour is probably best (but that doesn’t meant you can’t have fun) but if you feel really ambitious (read: confident) you can go for a complimentary pattern. I’m not going to elaborate. That is a regurgitated chunk of sartorial bird food from Steph. She’s gonna help me find the pic. I hope.